


Caesura

by Spatchcock



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, Established Relationship, Hope, Infinity War Fixit, Infinity War spoilers, M/M, Thorki - Freeform, fixit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-30
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-30 06:16:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14490648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spatchcock/pseuds/Spatchcock
Summary: The strong, slender body in his arms fills the ache in his soul. Thor exhales gustily into Loki’s silky, curling black hair and rests his forehead against Loki’s temple.“I’ve missed you,” he murmurs.





	Caesura

**Author's Note:**

> Unbetaed. Bragi tore this from my fingers and my muse slapped it on the page.
> 
> I absolutely flat-out _refuse_ to accept that our Silvertongue is irreversibly dead. You can’t make me. He is the God of Chaos and always finds a way out.

Thor opens his eyes.

_Eyes_ , both his, no prosthetics. A dream, then.

Truly a dream, because what he beholds is Asgard, home, bright and shining in the sunlight. The light feels young and fresh somehow. He tips his head back to gaze at the impossible blueness of the remembered sky and feels his hair slide off his shoulders. A dream of long ago.

A dream of a peaceful time, because he wears no armor, only a light tunic and loose leggings, in dark reds, suitable for a quiet day in the palace. Indoor shoes, slippers really, with designs embroidered in gold thread. He recognizes them — Norns, these slippers are well over a thousand years old. Were. 

Mjolnir is here, somewhere; he can feel her faint familiar tingle under the skin of his palm. He considers calling her. He knows she would come — this is a dream — but decides against it. The loss is still too fresh.

Too _many_ losses are still too fresh. Little wonder he is dreaming of home, of home of ages past. 

Thor becomes aware he is standing in an archway, on a balcony. On his balcony. Behind him are his rooms. Adjoining his rooms —

— are Loki’s. 

_That_ loss is so fresh he is still in denial of it. He is halfway through the room towards the door before he realizes he has turned. That happens, in dreams.

The hall is so vast that even his soft slippered steps echo slightly. The memory of the sound is warm. He doesn’t knock on Loki’s door. They never knocked. They never had anything to hide from one another. They shared parents, teachers, lessons, books, a table, a bathing chamber, a bath, a bed, their bodies; boundaries were meaningless. 

It is why it hurts so much. It is worse than losing a limb. Worse than losing his eye. He has lost his heart.

Loki is not in the sitting area, but Thor didn’t expect him to be. On days like this, on quiet afternoons when everyone is resting, Thor will always find his brother in one place: his workshop.

Which is where he is now. Thor can hear the soft clink of glass and metal as Loki works. The pull at his heart is so fierce he barely feels the tingle of the ward admitting him as he strides through the doorway (the ward which allows only him, and him always, because no matter how they quarrel, Loki never shuts Thor out of his work, and Thor insists on having Loki at his side in all things, and they are together, Thor and Loki, Loki and Thor, brothers, lovers, beloved, forever). 

Thor slows down as he comes up behind Loki. Thor is ever welcome but Thor is not stupid; he knows better than to disrupt or startle his brother in the middle of what might be something delicate, or explosive. 

Loki turns his head just a bit, just for a moment, enough to acknowledge his brother’s presence without pausing, and Thor knows it’s safe to come close and wrap him in a hug. 

He does.

The strong, slender body in his arms fills the ache in his soul. Thor exhales gustily into Loki’s silky, curling black hair and rests his forehead against Loki’s temple. 

“I’ve missed you,” he murmurs. Loki smells of rosemary despite the chemicals in the shop and whatever it is he’s working on. He always smells of rosemary.

“You have terrible aim,” his brother responds. Thor huffs out a laugh despite himself. He loves their banter. 

“What are you working on?” He doesn’t actually care; he just wants to hear Loki talk about what interests him. He misses his brother so, so much.

“A growth enhancer for grain. Something to increase yield.” He adds three precise drops to the beaker and lifts it to the light coming in from the window, swirling the liquid around to make it dissolve. “If the plant grows too fast, it’s weak and topples over before it can be harvested. If the plant is too strong, it’s inedible.”

“A problem,” Thor agrees.

“So I have to strike a balance.”

Thor flinches at the word, tries to suppress it. But then, what does it matter? This is only a dream. 

Loki notices anyway.

“A compromise,” he amends. “A certain amount of this, a certain amount of that.” Thor can only nod against Loki’s shoulder. Even in the dream, he cannot trust himself to speak; his throat is choked with tears. It hurts.

Loki makes a note on a paper and sets the beaker aside, reaching for something else. Thor watches without seeing, just breathing, just _being_ with Loki, feeling his brother’s cool skin grow warm under his touch, feeling his lungs expand with air, feeling his heart beat.

They stay like this for a few minutes; dream-time is hard to measure. Eventually Loki finishes whatever he is doing and wipes his hands clean on a soft cloth. “Did you want something in particular, brother?” he asks. “Or does the minutiae of rule fascinate you even unto monitoring food production?” 

“No,” Thor says huskily. “Just the pleasure of your company.” 

Loki frowns and turns in Thor’s embrace, running his hands up Thor’s arms to his shoulders. “What’s the matter?” 

Thor cannot answer. He looks down, at Loki’s work shirt, dark green and blotched with remnants of other experiments. If he thinks about it he can name some of them. Remember them. 

“I _miss_ you,” he says again, plaintively. 

“Thor. I’m here.” 

_Those_ words — in _that_ voice —

Thor breaks.

The strength runs out of his legs like water, and he collapses. Loki catches him somehow, holds him upright, and hasn’t that always been the way of it? Hasn’t he always relied on his brother’s strength to hold him up? How can he ever stand again?

Thor clings to him, buries his face in Loki’s shoulder and tries not to sob. “I don’t think I can do this any more, Kina,” he says brokenly. 

“Do what?” Why is dream-Loki asking him? As if he does not know! Even in his grief, even in his dream, Thor thinks this is just like his brother, to be irritatingly coy just for the sake of it. 

“I can’t go on like this — I can’t — I’ve lost — I’ve lost so much — it’s _too_ much — ”

“Brother, you _can_ ,” Loki reassures him, tugging him upright, cupping Thor’s face, wiping away the tears with his thumbs. “You must.” 

“Must I?” Thor cries. “How? How can I go on, how can I be strong, how can I protect the realms, how can I get out of _bed_ when half my soul is gone?” 

Loki rolls his eyes and smiles fondly. “You’re being a bit over-dramatic, don’t you think?”

“I am not,” Thor answers, and the seriousness of his tone melts Loki’s smile away. “First Mother. Then Father. Mjolnir. The Einherjar. Fandral, Hogun, Volstagg, Asgard. My eye. Heimdall. Half our people. _You_ — ” His voice breaks on the last. He inhales a shuddering breath and cradles the back of his brother’s neck in one hand, the most precious treasure he has ever held. “Loki, elskede. Brother. _You_. I think I could bear any loss if I had not lost you.” 

“But you haven’t lost me, Thena. I’m right here,” Loki insists. 

“You’re not,” Thor whispers, and closes his eyes. “This is a dream. A beautiful, golden dream, but I am only dreaming.” 

Loki kisses him then, fierce and sharp and full of teeth as Loki’s kisses always are, and Thor kisses him back, desperate and drowning. He crushes his brother against him, as if he could wrench Loki from death’s very hands with the sheer strength of his hold. 

Loki pulls back, panting, green eyes blazing. “Thor. You are an _idiot_. I am a _sorcerer_. You haven’t lost me. I’m _here_.” 

Thor becomes aware of certain things.

The physicality of his presence asserts itself. The breeze coming through the open window is cooling the tears on his face. A clock ticks softly in a corner of the room. There’s a bit of itchy trim rubbing against his left hip where his pants have shifted. His feet are planted solidly on the river stones of the workshop floor, which are cool and rounded beneath his thin-soled slippers.

Loki had never cared about crop yield on Asgard, but they had discussed the food situation repeatedly on the _Statesman_ while en route to Earth.

In dreams, the view never goes dark. You never truly _close your eyes_ in dreams, and yet he had, when he had kissed Loki.

Is he... _not dreaming?_

“…Loki?” he says tremulously.

His brother’s eyes burn into his, demanding. 

“You need to hold on, Thor. You need to be strong. I promised you the sun would shine on us again. And it _will_. But you will need to hold on.” He smiles now, wicked and loving both. “I’m _here_.” 

 

Thor opens his eye.

_Eye_ , singular. He took out the prosthetic before he collapsed. He remembers now.

It is cool and dark in the room Stark’s woman had given him in the new building, good for sleeping, terrible for comfort. Thor stares hard at the gray walls and blurry furniture shapes until he reorients himself, and then slumps back, covering his wet face with his hands. It had felt so _real_. He inhales, shakily, deeply, to calm himself — 

_— rosemary —_

_I’m here._


End file.
